Get Out: Jews & Elite American Universities

American universities have become hostile to Jews and it’s time for Jews to stop paying for them.

When I immigrated to America, 20 years ago this fall, I had just over $2,000 in my pocket that I’d saved working as a night watchman at a factory back home in Israel. I also had an inflatable mattress on the floor of a friend’s one-bedroom in White Plains, New York, and a promise that I could stay for two weeks, maybe three, until I found a place of my own. But most importantly, I had a story about my future.

As soon as I woke up that first morning, I took the train to 116th and Broadway, got off, strolled through the gates of Columbia University, and stood there gazing at the bronze Alma Mater sculpture guarding the steps to Low Library. Her face was serene, her lap adorned by a thick book, and her arms open wide, to embrace, or so I imagined, folks like me who were reasonably smart and wildly motivated and ready to work as hard as was needed to make something of themselves. In a year, maybe two, I thought, I’d find my way into the ivied cloister, and when I emerged on the other end I’d no longer be just another impoverished newcomer: A Columbia degree would accredit me, would validate me and suggest to those around me, from members of my family to potential employers, that I was a man in full, worthy of my slice of the American pie.

It wasn’t a story I had made up on my own. It was, in many ways, the foundational story of American Jewish life in the 20th century. Surveying the student body in major American universities between 1911 and 1913, the newly founded intercollegiate Menorah Association discovered 400 Jews at Cornell, 325 at the University of Pennsylvania, and 160 at Harvard; by 1967, The New York Timesreported that 40% of the student body in both Penn and Columbia were Jewish, with Yale, Harvard, and Cornell lagging behind with a mere 25%. For a minority that today is still just three or four generations removed from the deprivations of the old continent and that never rose much further above the 2% mark of the population at large, education—especially at renowned universities—was a magical wardrobe that led into a Narnia of possibilities. All you had to do was open the door.

The century-long relationship between American Jews and the nation’s elite universities has rotted away.

Sadly, that door is now closing. It’s not just that the number of Jewish students in the Ivies are plummeting—Harvard’s class of 2020, for example, is only 6% Jewish. It’s that the universities themselves, responding to a host of larger cultural, social, and political trends, have divested themselves of the values and practices that have made them mighty engines of American intellectual and economic growth as well as a springboard for striving Americans, Jews and non-Jews alike.

Jewish students from well-heeled American families may still vie for places at Yale or Princeton; proud Jewish parents may still giddily direct the family minivan to Cambridge while touring prospective colleges; and wealthy Jewish philanthropists may still give generously and gratefully to the institutions that helped make their success possible. These people are well intentioned, but the evidence has become overwhelming that they are now throwing good money after bad: The century-long relationship between American Jews and the nation’s elite universities has rotted away. Now is the time for all of the good people involved—students, parents, donors—to get out, and fast.

American universities are openly breaking their bonds with the Jewish community by embracing active discrimination against Jewish students and rejecting their intellectual, emotional, and moral attachments to the values of equal human dignity, universal rights, critical inquiry, and rational thought. Last month, the student-run College Council at Williams, one of the nation’s top-rated liberal arts colleges, denied the request of a new student-run group to be recognized as a Registered Student Organization. The group, Williams Initiative for Israel, is dedicated to promoting Israeli culture and the Jewish state’s right to exist. The council provided no reason for its refusal, and, breaking with protocol, allowed anonymous voting, scrubbed names of participants from the protocol, and disabled the livestream of the council’s meeting, deeply compromising the transparency of the voting process. The decision violates Williams’ own Code of Conduct, which states that the school shall be “committed to being a community in which all ranges of opinion and belief can be expressed and debated. … The College seeks to assure the right of all to express themselves in words and actions, so long as they can do so without infringing upon the rights of others or violating standards of good conduct or public law.”

What they hate are the values that used to make American universities great, and that made Jews such a great fit for American universities.

Jewish students should take note. What the undergraduate Jacobins at Williams hate isn’t Bibi Netanyahu, or “the occupation,” or even Zionism. What they hate are the values that used to make American universities great, and that made Jews such a great fit for American universities. In an intellectual environment increasingly governed by fear—adopt our rigid worldview or be labeled racist, sexist, homophobic, transphobic, Islamophobic, ableist, or worse—and living almost entirely in the shadows, away from public scrutiny, the true intellectual seeker is not an asset but a liability. There’s nothing Jewish students, at Williams or anywhere else, can do to change that. They should realize, as many already do, that they’re not disliked and targeted because of the views they hold, which they might conceivably change; they’re disliked and targeted because of who they are. Paying for teenagers to be subjected to this kind of rejection and abuse is an act of communal self-destructiveness that we would be smart to eschew.

If this sounds like needless histrionics, consider the case of NYU. After seven years of hard work and good fortune, I graduated with a Ph.D. from Columbia in 2007, and was thrilled to find employment teaching at the downtown campus of New York’s other great university. It didn’t take long for me to realize that no amount of effort or excellence—not even a teaching award I had won a few years into my career—would absolve me of the original sin of failing to conform to my colleagues’ rigid worldview, a zealous outlook that anointed all the world’s minorities as inherently and irredeemably oppressed and condemned the Jews to play the comically ahistorical role of privileged white oppressors.

Believing that a great university was nothing if not an arena for the free and unfettered exchange of ideas, I tried to engage in conversation and debate, only to find that those presumably shared values were no longer on the menu. When I asked to attend a colleague’s seminar on boycotting Israel, my request was declined. Instead, I was told bluntly that only those who supported singling out the world’s sole Jewish state for calumny might attend. I understood that my days by Washington Square Park were numbered. I left NYU and the teaching profession a short while later. When I think back on that time, which is often, I am struck not so much by personal anger as by an unbearable sadness for a formerly great institution that, having once nurtured everyone from Judy Blume to Alan Greenspan, is now inhospitable both to Jews and to the larger intellectual tradition that helped Jews flourish in America.

Just how inhospitable that place has become was evident this month, when the university’s branch of Students for Justice in Palestine won the Presidential Service Award, one of the highest honors NYU bestows on members of its academic community. The decision shocked and angered many in NYU’s Jewish community, who noted that the group’s actions frequently veered into the violent and the anti-Semitic: In 2014, for example, the group targeted Jewish students by handing out fake eviction notices in what it argued was a protest of Israel’s policies, and in 2018 two SJP members were arrested after forcefully crashing a campus celebration of Israel’s Independence Day, seizing Israeli flags, and setting them on fire. Most recently, several of the group’s members accosted Chelsea Clinton at an NYU memorial to the victims of the deadly shooting at a Christchurch, New Zealand, mosque, accusing her of stoking murderous Islamophobia due to her questioning earlier this year of Rep. Ilhan Omar’s anti-Semitic statements about Jewish money purchasing political influence. How, many on campus and off wondered, could such a bigoted bunch win a major award at any university, let alone one whose most celebrated schools are named for the well-known Jewish families who paid for them to be built?

The question proved surprisingly difficult to answer. The Presidential Service Awards, according to the university’s website, “are given to students or student organizations that have had an extraordinary and positive impact on the university community.” Just who decides what accounts for “positive impact,” however, was unclear: A university spokesperson replied that the awardees are chosen by a volunteer committee of faculty, administrators, and student representatives, but would divulge neither the nomination process nor criteria, nor the identity of any of the committee’s members.

Attempts to find an answer to these seemingly simple questions proved futile. Emails to several officials at the office of the SVP of Student Affairs, which administers the awards, went unreturned. Enlisting the help of several of my former colleagues who still teach at the university proved equally futile: Even those currently employed by NYU could not get their colleagues to say precisely who gets to decide for the university what passes for award-worthy merit.

Concerned by these developments, a handful of NYU’s Jewish trustees and donors began exchanging emails and phone calls, wondering what to do. Their obvious address, according to several people who participated in these exchanges or are familiar with them, was the university’s president, Andrew Hamilton. The president, according to one donor who spoke to him but prefers to remain unnamed, “said all the right things,” reiterating his commitment to keeping Jewish students feeling safe and welcomed at NYU.

“Had it been up to me,” Hamilton wrote last month in a letter to The Wall Street Journal, “SJP would not have received the award—not because of its politics or NYU’s opposition to its pro-boycott, divestment and sanctions positions, but because SJP’s behavior has been divisive.”

But just what can one university president do to affect the nature and tone of life on his or her campus? The answer, it seemed, was not much: After Hamilton skipped the award ceremony, NYU’s Department of Social and Cultural Analysis decided to escalate the fight against Israel and pledge noncooperation with the university’s study-abroad program in Tel Aviv. No sanctions were proposed against NYU’s satellite campuses in Shanghai or Abu Dhabi, nor was an explanation given as to how or why the department chose to take the unprecedented step of promulgating its own policy, directly contradicting those of the university at large. The department’s website currently states that it “encourages its faculty and student members to act in the spirit of noncooperation outlined in the Resolution,” but several department officials failed to return emails asking what measures, if any, would be taken against students who choose to exercise their right to study in Tel Aviv. It remains unclear what, if anything, President Hamilton or anyone else at NYU can or will do to discipline the department.

Jewish donors must ask themselves why they should continue to financially aid institutions that offer little accountability or transparency, while incubating hate.

The problems that the scuffles at NYU or Williams present far transcend the specific bureaucratic entanglements and leadership issues at a handful of particular academic institutions. Similar stories occur in universities throughout the nation, raising the question of what, if anything, future Jewish involvement with American academia should look like. On the most basic level, Jewish donors must ask themselves why they should continue to financially aid and abet institutions that offer very little by way of accountability or transparency, while incubating hate. But the question runs deeper than that, touching on the very role the university currently plays in American life, and its utility for Jews or any other minority group wishing to make it in America.

For nearly a century, universities proved central to American Jewish life because they offered two assets without which few, particularly among the children or grandchildren of immigrants, could succeed. The first was knowledge. The second was accreditation, the lifeblood of any meritocracy; a graduate of a good university could depend on her diploma translating into a good job in an industry of her choice. Neither of these assets are available today: In the past 20 years, if not earlier, American universities have dramatically increased the cost of tuition while dramatically reducing the quality of product they deliver. In 2001, for example, the cost of a university education was 23% of median annual earnings; by 2011, the number soared to 38%, causing student debt to double. Around the same time, a federal survey tested the literacy of college-educated citizens—defined as “using printed and written information to function in society, to achieve one’s goals and to develop one’s knowledge and potential”—and found that only a quarter were deemed proficient.

The startling failure of American universities to teach basic skills in advertised areas of competence is due to a host of factors, including the emergence of identity-politics-related fields of study devoted to the promulgation of sectarian dogma rather than to independent thinking and research. It is also closely related to the shifting identity of those doing most of the teaching: In 1969, for example, about 78% of faculty members in American universities and colleges held tenured or tenure-track positions; today, that number is roughly 20%, with all other classes, including at elite institutions, being taught by poorly-paid adjuncts. At NYU, for example, a majority of classes—55%—are taught by adjunct professors who earn as little as $800 a month per class. Many of these adjuncts—I speak from experience here—are excellent and dedicated teachers, but their compensation makes it impossible for them to invest any real time in their students, or to risk even the glancing disapproval of activist students or faculty, which might deprive them of their meager stipends.

This rapid decline in the quality of the education that American universities offer might not have impacted the value of their diploma had the tech industry not disrupted all aspects of life, giving birth to an economy that values a highly specialized skillset that can be just as easily learned on YouTube or in a six-week coding class. Stories of famous billionaires dropping out of college abound (see under: Zuckerberg, Mark), as do tales of renegades paying young Americans to forgo college and go into business instead (see under: Thiel, Peter). But you needn’t go to extremes to evaluate the profound crisis of accreditation that American universities are experiencing these days: If you’d like a job and haven’t a degree, you can find employment not only at Costco and Chipotle but also at Google, Apple, IBM, and the Bank of America. With colleges, for the most part, teaching very little by way of remunerative skills, it’s safe to assume that many other employers will follow suit, making the requisite college degree a thing of the past, the equivalent of a gold-embossed certificate from the Che Guevara Finishing School.

The evolution of even the finest American universities into hotbeds of dogmatic identity politics make them increasingly inhospitable to Jews and to Jewishness.

The rapid decay of American universities as purveyors of useful or profound knowledge impacts all Americans, not just Jews. But Jews suffer from some particular drawbacks that make universities not just an inane waste of time and money but downright hostile environments. The evolution of even the finest American universities into hotbeds of dogmatic identity politics and very little else make them increasingly inhospitable to Jews and to Jewishness, an identity that privileges the questioning and challenging of majority dogmas. It took well over a thousand years for Western civilization to allow open challenges to the metaphysics that painted Jews and the values of questioning and difference that they embodied as inherently offensive to God; it took even longer for societies to see that those values might be a powerful engine of human intellectual and social development, and to insist that all citizens should at least theoretically be equal under the law. While it is hard to say how long it will take to reverse the headlong retreat of American universities into medieval sectarian idiocy, it is unlikely to happen anytime soon. In the meantime, though Jews may be unable to reverse this calamity on their own, there is no reason why they should be footing the bill for it, either.

So here’s my advice: Put that felt Harvard pennant back in your closet, and file those fundraising letters from your alma mater in the garbage can, where they belong. Why? Because she just doesn’t love you anymore. If you’re a young Jew who is thinking about tagging your parents with the bill for a famous college or university, don’t bother—you’ll do just as well, if not better, in today’s America without an expensive diploma, and you’ll get a much better education by getting a job, renting an apartment, and seeing how Americans actually live these days, outside of safe spaces and ideological echo chambers, while reading great books and educating yourself away from the dogmatic madness of the modern-day academy. If you must apply to a college or a university, in order to learn a specific technical skill that is somehow unavailable on the internet, refuse to subject yourself to any environment that displays, even remotely, the sort of ugly symptoms on display at Williams or NYU. An institution that does not demand basic civility and true respect for intellectual diversity isn’t worth your time as a scholar.

And finally, Jewish communal machers: Please stop offering up lavish new buildings and campus centers and multimillion-dollar bequests in honor of your fathers and mothers, who would probably be rolling over in their graves if they could see and hear what goes on inside the buildings that bear their names. Any Jewish donor invested in any institution in which Jewish students regularly live in fear of retribution from classmates or teachers for asserting their own basic human dignity and attachment to the values of free inquiry and critical reasoning should demand her or his money back. Let the Qataris or the Saudis be the suckers who pay for the hatred and gibberish in which so many American university students are being forced to major.

American universities, their faculties, and their student activists are of course at liberty to exercise their academic freedoms in whatever ways they choose; they can turn their institutions into radical chic summer camps and publish all the books they want about the IDF harvesting Palestinian organs. In a world premised on free choice and open inquiry, many individuals—and institutions—may embrace ideas that are utterly idiotic and vile. Freedom also means that Jews should not be expected to pay for turning their children into second-class citizens, or for the destruction of the values that have made our lives as Americans possible.

Except for it's great length which I fear too many don't have the focus to be able to appreciate, this article should be required reading for every Jewish day school student and their teachers. And everyone who ever went to one of these so-called prestigious places of education.

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Nathan,
May 22, 2019 11:50 AM

Extrapolate

The stark truth is that your advice to "get out" applies not only to the universities.It is applicable to the country as a whole.

Anonymous,
May 23, 2019 12:52 AM

I Support H.Res. 326

No, it is to demand that our Congress and President come out against antisemitism to the fullest extent so Jews are free to be, live and worship in the US. where they are citizens.

Total support for H.Res. 326 to proclaim the U.S stance of a 2 state solution, end to occupation and reigning in of settlement expansion in West Bank.

The killing of Jews at Prayer in Shuls the last 6 mos., attempts the last 2 weeks, vandalism with swastikas is disgraceful...

It is deeply concerning the removal of the Hating George Soros article by Yvette Miller to denounce hatred of Jews on the left was removed from this site

The anti Left sentiments are appalling. You should be ashamed, as a Jewish institution you should be promoting One People. I am beyond disgusted.

Natan,
May 23, 2019 9:55 AM

Yeah, because demands to congress will work, right?

Our history has shown that they will ignore our demands/petitions/pleas/etc.The most stark example is Nazi Germany.

I mentioned not a word about left or right political positions. There are plenty on both sides that hate us.

I never wrote anything about George Soros, so I'm not sure why you're posting anything related to that in response to my post.

I made no mention of H.Res 326 (though I'm not for it).

My sole point was that Jews in America should get out because history repeats itself.Where should they go? To Israel, of course. The Torah says we should. Totally independent of whether or not we are the sovereign power there or not.Of course, that's been a challenge for us again and again.

Some uncomfortable realities:

The thing that we need to wake up to is that they don't want your/our education.They don't need your/our permission to hate us. Some of the most virulent enemies of our past have been very educated about us and experts in whatever other field they were in.It has nothing to do with ignorance - accept that you/we will NOT educate them into accepting us.

The inverse is also true. Namely, we do NOT owe them an explanation. We need to do what we are charged with and make it clear we don't need their approval. When we explain, it only weakens us in their eyes (and in our own).

Visions of a long-lasting golden era for Jews in America are proving to be wrong before our very eyes.Europe is obviously worse.The best way to fight anti-semitism is to put our money where our mouths are (we say it every day in our Amidah prayer) - move to Israel. This is not Zionism - this is Judaism.As usual, G-d is reminding us through our enemies what the basic facts are: The enemy doesn't separate Jew and Israel - neither should we...

(14)
Anonymous,
May 20, 2019 11:50 PM

Have already stopped donations to Columbia and NYU

Full agree with author and I have stopped donations to Columbia and NYU and stopped any communications to or from Columbia.

(13)
Gary Colwill,
May 20, 2019 3:32 PM

Great Line

"With colleges, for the most part, teaching very little by way of remunerative skills, it’s safe to assume that many other employers will follow suit, making the requisite college degree a thing of the past, the equivalent of a gold-embossed certificate from the Che Guevara Finishing School."

Very nicely expressed!

(12)
Jeff,
May 20, 2019 2:19 PM

Free inquiry?

Leibovitz says universities are rejecting Jewish "attachments to the values of equal human dignity, universal rights, critical inquiry, and rational thought"!!! If Leibovitz believes in universal rights, he should support granting the vote to everyone, not just Jews, in Judea and Samaria. He can't say it's because they will have their own state eventually -- because Netanyahu has made it clear they will NEVER have a fully independent state. As long as he support racial restrictions on the vote in Judea and Samaria, he will show less attachment to universal rights than the people he is denouncing. And "equal human dignity"? When Palestinians can be picked up in the night and held for years without charges, or convicted in kangaroo military courts, or have their homes demolished because they're related to someone accused of a crime, or denied a building permit because of their race, or have their land stolen because of their race -- all things that are never done to Jews -- equal human dignity can hardly exist.

Yoni,
May 20, 2019 3:20 PM

Voting

As I noted below, I agree that all Palestinians should have the right to vote provided that they act like citizens. A good first step would be to stop trying to murder Jews. Once their done with that, they can stop all the incitement in the schools and support for terror. Next, they can support freedom of religion in the areas they currently control (for some reason all the areas under Palestinian control are judenrein). Once they achieve those steps, they will be starting the process to show that they can function in a free Democrat society.

The simple fact is that the current makeup of Palestinian society is one that would like to destroy Israel. This is clearly evidenced when the opportunity for free elections was presented, they overwhelmingly voted in Hamas, a terrorist organization who’s charter calls for the destruction of Israel and the murder of Jews. It would be akin to granting members of Al qada and ISIS voting rights in the United States. It just doesn’t make sense.

Jeff,
May 20, 2019 3:51 PM

Are you kidding?

If they renounce violence, they will get the vote? To the contrary, Israel fears nonviolent activism for equal rights far more than violence. It knows how to handle violence. But Gandhian tactics pose a bigger threat:nybooks.com/daily/2019/05/13/a-palestinian-in-israeli-military-court-issa-amro-the-judge-me

Yoni,
May 20, 2019 5:47 PM

Wow! A solution!

Jeff, you’ve just got the solution to the conflict. All the Palestinians need to do is renounce violence and Israel will not know what to do. The Palestinians will have their state. Instead, they enjoy shooting rockets into civilian population centers. No Jews are allowed to live in Palestinian controlled areas. If a Jew makes a wrong turn and ends up in a Palestinian controlled area, they are likely to be lynched. If only the Palestinians would cease their virulent racism and show respect for their Jewish neighbors, adopt “Ghandian tactics”, stop ceaselessly trying to murder Jews and we would have peace.

Alan S.,
May 20, 2019 6:48 PM

Please re-read your own first response....

When ---- the Jewish people have rights under Palestinian rule; -- a Jewish person can write a comment to a Palestinian web-site such as Aish.com;;-- a Palestinian web site exists for Palestinians to complain to their brethren such as you do (I assume you are Jewish, but obviously I can be wrong) about the wrongs that Palestinians commit against Israelis, such as, to use just one example - flying flaming kites to Israel,

THEN there could be moral equivalency and an opinion such as you have would be valid.

Let the readers of Aish.com know when these things have occurred.

Anonymous,
May 20, 2019 9:46 PM

Deleted comment

This comment has been deleted.

Alan S.,
May 20, 2019 10:42 PM

Remember what Freud said.

"Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar." Anti- semitism can be seen clearly in Tlaibs comments.

Anonymous,
May 21, 2019 6:06 AM

Synogogue was targeted Sun. a.m.

Twice, in Chicago. Arsonists tried to set it on fire. Also, 3 arson attacks last week in Boston.

Raymond,
May 23, 2019 8:49 PM

Not-So-Subtle antisemitism

Somehow I get the feeling that those who champion Palestinian rights over that of the safety and security of Jews in our own State of Israel, are really doing nothing more than using still another excuse to express one's hatred toward our Jewish people.

Anonymous,
May 23, 2019 11:18 PM

And I

am not sure that Jews who state they are agnostic or aethiest are not expressing the same hatred as you say. How can one be Jewish without a deep faith and trust and relationship, with G-d, but I accept all Jews as Jews -.... and that to call a Jew antisemitic is simply an intolerable thing.

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Michael Mann,
May 19, 2019 10:40 PM

Their loss

Time to abandon the diaspora for Israel where the light she sheds will stun the rest of the world.

(10)
Anonymous,
May 19, 2019 10:05 PM

Sad, and true observations; but, hopefully, there are some other more moderate, positive and promising ways/ideas that could first be tried; ideas able to bring about the necessary changes which can lead our institutions of higher education back to a

His response possibly urges going too far too fast. Even though I am now coming to realize that these trends demonstrate a frightening reality which didn't just happen over night, I fear a worsening situation for Jews would occur quickly if such severe reactions would happen in response. However, on the other hand, as the saying goes, "desperate sutuations call for desparate measures." I think it is imperative that this terrible development gets immediate necessary attention and a lot of publicity.

chaya,
May 19, 2019 11:34 PM

Didn't happen overnight

Groups like Students for Justice in Palestine began getting more vocal, in that at first only Hillels and Pro Israel and American Jewish students as ambassadors for Israel, had events to celebrate Israel, with Independence Day celebrations, for example.

They were distressed as their knowkedge and experiences with loved ones living in occupied territories was not recognized. Whether you agree or not, their Nakba Day, the Catastrophe, is the same as Israel's Independence Day. 700,00 Arabs living in historical Palestine were displaced. Their villages destroyed and the refugees exist to this day. Who is at fault, and there is plenty on both sides, is not the point, in a University setting that embraces exchange of ideas and free speech, when there exists another side that impacts students.

Only the Pro Israel side of things was heard and their loved ones were suffering daily. The Anti-Apartheid weeks, began as a way to get their voices heard, too, as American citizens. There is a military occupation in areas of West Bank under full military control, there is settlement expansion, there are 2 sides wanting all of the land and the others out.

There are 2 Peoples, both with a love for this Sacred space and neither wants to exist with the other as equals, with full citizenship for all. Israel wants Greater Israel, before Moshiach, and the Arabs want the River to the Sea.

The Palestinians suffer daily, disproportionately, and the world is beginning to hear them. Even Jewish groups, IfNotNow, Jewish Voice for Peace have sprung up, in support of Palestinians. So, this did not happen overnight.

Yoni,
May 20, 2019 12:04 AM

Moral equivalency?

The differences between the two causes should be obvious. One side is celebrating the Independence Day of a democratic country, the other side celebrates the murder of innocent civilians. ANY POLITICAL CAUSE THAT APPROVES OF THE MURDER OF CIVILIANS IS ABHORRENT!!! The very fact that this is presented as “equal” is symptomatic with what is wrong with what is being taught on the campuses today. In my humble opinion, to equate the two is shameful.

Yoni,
May 20, 2019 12:07 AM

Voting Citizens

As far as voting is concerned, I agree that all Palestinians should have the right to vote provided that they act like citizens. A good first step would be to stop trying to murder Jews. Once their done with that, they can stop all the incitement in the schools and support for terror. Next, they can support freedom of religion in the areas they currently control (for some reason all the areas under Palestinian control are judenrein). Once they achieve those steps, they will be starting the process to show that they can function in a free Democrat society.

chaya,
May 20, 2019 3:36 AM

100% against murder of civilians and innocents

100 %, Yoni.

Not all Palestinians are terrorists. There are many innocents, there too.

The retaliation (of course, not saying they should do nothing) in Gaza is impacting innocent civilians, too, they have no clean water, electricity 3 hours a day, hospitals can barely meet their needs, loss of life many times more than the other side, army is using bullets that shatter the limbs leading to amputations. If you have family there, people you love, you are not going to be saying, Israel is morally superior.

There are Israeli Jews who also protest, and Jstreet, also is a Jewish group. NONE of them think it is okay to terrorize, innocents. No one thinks killing Israeli citizens is okay... no one is saying that.

But, when you have students on campuses with personal experiences and well, Rashida Tlaib's grandmother lives in West Bank, they are seeing the IOF as engaging in human rights violations. Also, there is settler violence that is well documented, against Palestinians in West Bank, too.

I am on your side, I am a Jew and the rise in anti-semitism is terrifying. Hands- down, resistance that involves killing of innocents is terrorism.

Throwing stones, is mainly symbolic, and it seems as if any protest against occupation, is considered violence, but protest has to be allowed.

Yoni,
May 20, 2019 3:59 AM

There would be peace

Chaya, you seem to be a well meaning person that truly would like to see both sides fairly.

I would point out that there really is no equivalent between the Israeli position and the Palestinian position. How many innocent people are there when given the opportunity for free elections, they overwhelmingly voted for Hamas, a terrorist organization who’s charter calls for the destruction of Israel and the murder of Jews. The reason that they live with limited electricity and continue to get shot at is because they have an insatiable desire to shoot rockets into civilian populations.

Peace can be achieved tomorrow if the terror simply stopped. But the Palestinians continue to support Hamas and continue to try to destroy Israel. As Golda Meir has said, the day the Arabs learn to love their children more then they hate us there will be peace.

אֲ‍ֽנִי־שָׁ֭לוֹם וְכִ֣י אֲדַבֵּ֑ר הֵ֝֗מָּה לַמִּלְחָמָֽה׃I am all peace; but when I speak, they are for war. (Psalms 120)

Alan S.,
May 20, 2019 12:08 PM

Not the point of this article. But a good launching point to explain your lies.

Chaya, if all Palestinians were like you, there likely would be peace in the Middle East. But your statements belie the truth and decades of facts.

The article points out the sad truth about what is happening on college campuses. Like at NYU, there is no room for debate and Jewish opinion is drowned out by out-right suppression. Just like in the Middle East where the Palestinians and other Arab players basically obstruct peace with generations of Israelis.

Anonymous,
May 20, 2019 12:54 AM

Chaya, Get the facts right!

Yes, get the facts right, learn first about the history because everything you say is very wrong! When you want to say something, here or any place else, study first the facts, then discuss it, because there is not one thing you said is correct!

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Tuviah Berkowitz,
May 19, 2019 9:32 PM

It Comes Back to Bite You

Historically, we've seen a simple rule borne out repeatedly: Whenever Jews identify with a non-Jewish idea or institution, that idea or institution will eventually attack them.We should never have fallen in love with university life in the first place. Instead, we should have treated secular education only as a means to an end, not as a value in itself.This is a superb article, and while some readers may object to its conclusions, they should ask themselves if they are not responding out of misplaced sentiments about college.

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Yoni,
May 19, 2019 9:14 PM

The anti semitic left

As bastions of leftist liberal thought, it’s only natural that the campuses are cesspools of anti semitisim. As can be seen in the new age of liberal law makers such as Ilhan Omar, Rashida Tlaib and AOC, the new left is the anti Semitic left.
Although the scourge of anti semitisim also exits in the right in the form of neo natzis and the alt right, on the left it has become institutionalized.

chaya,
May 19, 2019 11:59 PM

Zionism vs. Judaism

It remains true that 75% or definitely most, of American Jews are politically affiliated with the Left. They are Pro-Israel, while also critical of Isreali policies within the government, and have struggled with The Woman's March, where they felt challenged with sentiments from the leaders that there could not not be a Palestinian exception.

I do not agree anti-semitism is institutionalized on the Left, and I see the greatest threat, as the white nationalists, neo-nazis, on the right, who feel more empowered by this administration, even though the President has also denounced anti-semitism.

The question is, how as the Jewish People, One People, who received Torah at Sinai do we come together... because politics is creating tremendous division between us. Anti-semitism is rising, and haters with intent to kill, do not care your denomination or politics. Whether at a Chabad House or a Reconstructionist Temple, Jews are Jews. We need to demand we be free to worship as citizens in diaspora.

Anonymous,
May 20, 2019 12:46 AM

Get the facts!

Chaya, in order for you to have an opinion, you need to go back and study well the facts about history!Let me tell you that I wish a peaceful two states solution.But the key for peace is at the hands of Hamas! a terrorist organization that used to perpetrate horrible terror attacks against Israelis before Israel installed the wall.Instead, today they are using new technologies to invade social networks, to confirm, manipulate emotions, transmit political fictions and deny facts and change history!

Israel was occupied by many people in the past, and all along small Jewish communities kept living in Israel, same goes with some Jewish communities who escaped the inquisition and settled in Israel. so if there were Arabs living in Israel, so were Jews.

Archaeology, artifacts, everything found in Israel tell the story of Jewish people. Only ignorance about history can confirm the opposite.

(7)
Josh,
May 19, 2019 7:47 PM

Eloquent and Accurate

As someone who is graduating from university this week I can attest to the accuracy of these words. This is an extremely well written article that summarizes the sad state of affairs on college campuses nowadays. Long gone is the notion of a university as a place where everything is to be challenged and debated, a place of open inquiry and investigation. Very sad.

(6)
Alan s.,
May 19, 2019 7:41 PM

A noteworthy article about the only way to deal with these schools.

For years, on this forum and others, I've said that wealthy Jewish donors should not be spending one penny on propping up these clearly virulently anti-Semitic, anti-Zionist, anti-Israel hot beds of leftist liberal radicalism. And, I wouldn't give a penny to any college that would permit the same thing by any rightist, fascist groups on campus either.

As the article says, to all the Jewish machers as well as decent non-Jewish donors that want to have buildings named in their honor, first look and see what your money is supporting. If you are an NYU donor, for instance, your are tacitly supporting groups that would first see your throats slit than to give you respect for your money.

(5)
Anonymous,
May 19, 2019 6:43 PM

Talented and exceptional students will always succeed!

The author of this article has issued sooo many problems going on at universities , I don't know where to start, that is why will summarize: 1. Universities unable to stop racism, bigotry are predicted to fall! Also to affect deeply the nation's economy!2. Regarding BDS meetings, and not allowing all sides to have a say, is contraproductive and ignorant, fascist, anti semitism! 3. A drop of Jewish enrollment at elite universities, is shameful, unjust! Never display your Jewish identity! Or if your family name sounds too Jewish, change your name and recover it once you are done with school! It is very sad what I just have said, people should be proud of who they are and never hide their identity in a democracy! 4. Today, universities sound more like enterprise, they don't care about quality anymore! Everything they are interested is money!5. Hopefully other countries will follow Germany who has recently ban BDS in their country, saying it is anti Semitic! 6. Talented and exceptional students will always succeed no matter where they go to study! By the end, Elite universities will become mediocre and will be called something else!

(4)
Emil M Friedman,
May 19, 2019 5:15 PM

In particular, MIT and Princeton both have

orthodox student groups and Chabads near their campuses.

(3)
Emil M Friedman,
May 19, 2019 5:07 PM

There are kosher meal plans at many prestigious universities.

Many also have Chabads and orthodox services on campus.

Natan,
May 22, 2019 11:47 AM

Ummm... yeah

Yes, and they are increasingly experiencing the issues the author of this article mentioned.I used to go to the Princeton Hillel for years as I worked in the area. I personally experienced blatant jew hatred on several occasions. An that was 15 years ago. It's gotten MUCH worse.

(2)
William C. Levenson,
May 19, 2019 4:35 PM

Times have changed.

Brilliant article. I would like to see wealthy individuals in the Jewish community build Jewish-themed schools that protect all students from harm. Copy Liberty U and Hillsdale College? I suffered leftist persecution at Cal State U in the 1970's. Not easy being Jewish .

(1)
Abraham Getzler,
May 19, 2019 4:28 PM

Drop this article into their fund raising return article instead of a check

It's not enough to stop sending the corrupted universities money. You have to tell them why. So print a copy of this article and send it back to the universities instead of a check next time they ask for money.

Nancy,
May 21, 2019 11:21 AM

To commenter #1 Abraham Getzler

Yes! I agree with you completely. Will this bring about change overnight? No, but it just might bring about change over time. Additionally, I would send the link to this article to anyone who is college bound. In my experience, there are many Jews who really have no clue about the anti Semitism on campus.